


Background Noises

by fandomsandxfiles



Series: Files From the FBI's Most Unwanted [15]
Category: The X-Files
Genre: Canon Compliant, Episode: s06e03 Triangle, F/M, POV Outsider, Vignettes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-19
Updated: 2021-01-19
Packaged: 2021-03-17 06:08:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,405
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28844337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fandomsandxfiles/pseuds/fandomsandxfiles
Summary: They were normally confined to the basement, the two strange agents who were never out of sync. But now that they had desks like everyone else, their lives were a spectacle to the rest of the FBI. And something was clearly wrong today, the rest of the building noticed, as they watched her tear through the hallways of the office.
Relationships: Fox Mulder/Dana Scully
Series: Files From the FBI's Most Unwanted [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2020487
Comments: 11
Kudos: 29





	Background Noises

**Author's Note:**

> I recently rewatched Triangle, and I really wanted to write something from the points of view of the many people that watched the events unfold in passing, so this is that! Hope you like it!

Alison should have known today was going to be a strange day when she woke up to her cat throwing up on her new area rug. She had rushed to clean everything up, leaving a note for her roommate about what had happened with Snowball, and asked if she could call the vet when she got home. The two worked opposite times of the day, Alison as a receptionist for the FBI's Hoover building, and Angela as a night shift nurse at a nearby hospital. Snowball watched with big, sad eyes as Alison walked out the door. She would have liked to have stayed, but she was already late for work.

She had just barely sat down when she felt a rush of air through the lobby. She looked up, only to see the sea of arriving agents part for new arrivals. They were quite an odd-looking trio, the three men who arrived at her desk for visitor's passes. Two of the three stuck out like a sore thumb in the sea of dull suits and vacant expressions that normally passed by her desk. The third could fit in well if he wanted to, with his grey suit and tasteful tie, if it wasn't for the worried expression he wore. 

She could have sworn she had seen them before, but she couldn't quite tell for sure. You would think that she would have remembered them, because not many people show up at the FBI at nine o'clock in the morning like they did. They were cordial and polite as Alison passed them their visitors' badges, and they declined her offer to point them in the direction of where they needed to go. She watched as two of the men walked directly into the elevator, shouting at the third, who apparently had wanted to take the stairs. She watched them beckon at the man, who hurried into the elevator car right as the doors were starting to close. 

Alison wondered why they were here, what business they had, but not for long. She had more pressing matters to worry about. 

***

Special Agent Tom Jennings had enough to worry about as it was. His case reports were long overdue, and today was the last day he could hand them in and still expect to be able to come to work tomorrow. All he had to do was finish up the tail ends of those reports today, and he could have them in by lunch. Then he would go out and get himself a sandwich, from the expensive deli down the street. But only if he finished his reports first. 

He had come in earlier than normal to get these case files done, and so far it was going well. More people started arriving and settling into their desks, and he paid them no mind. He nodded and smiled at those who bid him good morning, but then went right back to work. 

He dropped his pen once, and watched it roll behind him. On any other day he might have just left it and grabbed a new one, but this time he didn't. It had rolled under an empty desk, and Tom quickly reached down and grabbed it, almost hitting his head in the process. 

_This desk wasn't usually empty_ , he thought, as he scanned over the stacks of paperwork sitting on it. _Who sat here?_ Then he remembered. 

It was hard for any agent to forget Fox Mulder. Gossip ran rampant any office, and the FBI was no exception to that. Fox Mulder was the FBI's resident conspiracy theorist, and him and his partner were often the subject of that gossip. Tom quickly looked over his shoulder to see if she was missing too, but Dana Scully was right there at her desk, working quietly. He didn't think too much on it, especially because he had some case reports to tackle. 

And he was almost done too, when the door to their area opened and three men came charging through the bullpen. They stopped at Agent Scully's desk, and he heard her ask them what they were doing. He couldn't quite make out what they were saying, but he caught some of the conversation. 

"Mulder's disappeared."

"From where?" 

"From the national reconnaissance office's lacrosse mid-latitude imaging radar satellite."

He couldn't hear the rest of their conversation, but he watched the four of them talk quietly among themselves. Part of his brain kept telling him to go back to his case reports, that he was so close to being done, but he just couldn't. Something way more interesting was happening. 

***

Sylvia had just found the time to drink the coffee she had brought into work this morning, but the moment she took the first sip, Agent Scully came barging in. "I need to speak with him," she said, leaving no room for argument. 

Agents Scully and Mulder technically weren't under A.D. Skinner's supervision anymore, so she shouldn't even be letting Agent Scully speak to the assistant director. "Could you please take a seat?" she asked Agent Scully, standing up from her desk. 

"Is he in?" Scully asked, not taking no for an answer. She had never seen Agent Scully like this before, despite having worked for the FBI since Agent Scully joined the X-Files. Something must be going on, but she had no idea what. 

"Yes, he's on the phone-"

"Sorry, this can't wait," Agent Scully said, walking right past her and opening the door to A.D. Skinner's office. 

"Wait-" Sylvia said, but it was no use. Agent Scully had already interrupted the assistant director's phone call, leaving the door to his office wide open. 

Skinner placed his hand over the receiver of the phone. "What is it Agent Scully?"

"I just received some very disturbing information, sir. I need your help."

Sylvia watched as her boss hung up the phone, and he spoke to Agent Scully in a low voice. She tried to listen to what they were saying, but she could only catch snippets of the conversation. 

"It's about Agent Mulder. He's done something incredibly rash."

"I can't help you. There's nothing I can do."

"Don't you want to know what this is about?"

The two of them walked closer and closer to the door, where Sylvia was just standing and watching. Skinner's voice got louder. "I'm not allowed to have contact with you - any contact with either you or Mulder."

That's when Sylvia decided to cut in. "She walked right past me sir." 

But Agent Scully wasn't going to give up that easily. She grabbed the door and closed it harshly, staring at Skinner is disbelief. Their voices could still be heard from behind the door, but Sylvia just sat back down at her desk. At this point, there was nothing she could do. 

***

The elevator car was already packed with more people than it probably could handle, and all Special Agent Jenna Carter wanted to do was get to her meeting on time. She stepped into the elevator with a few others and immediately moved to the side as when she saw Special Agent Dana Scully enter the elevator as well, a worried look on her face. She leaned over and pressed the button for the floor she wanted, and then hovered in front of the closed doors. 

Agent Scully fidgeted with the piece of paper in her hands as the doors closed, tapping her foot so that the click of her shoe echoed through the small space. Her tall partner was noticeably missing from the general vicinity, which shocked Jenna, because she had honestly thought they never went anywhere without the other. 

There weren't many people in the office who didn't know of Scully and Mulder, the two strange agents who used to work out of the basement, but now were stuck in the bullpens like the rest of them. Even if you'd never seen either of them around the office, you knew their name, because it was a fairly popular subject of gossip among all the other departments. The prevailing opinion was that they were definitely more than partners, and there were people who believed they had secretly gotten married on a case the first year they worked together, and now just kept it a secret because of the bureau's policy. But Jenna didn't like to participate in the gossip. 

Agent Scully was stressed, that much was painfully obvious. Everyone else in the elevator noticed as well, and several of the other women raised their eyebrows at her and pursed their lips. On any other day, Agent Scully might have noticed the strange looks she was being given, but today, that was the last thing on her mind. 

It must have felt like ages for her, but when the elevator doors finally opened, Agent Scully was immediately on her way. Jenna heard another woman yelp in pain moments after the door opened, and Agent Scully quickly whirled around to apologize, before taking off down the hallway. 

The elevator doors closed again, and Jenna wondered what had happened today. She hoped that Agent Mulder was okay. 

***

They definitely weren't his usual customer, James thought as the boat pulled away from the dock. Most of the people that hired him to take them out into the sea had no clear destination, and they were content just staring off at the horizon as the boat cruised through the water. They oohed and ahhed over the few dolphins that broke the surface of the water, and it was clear that they were on vacation. 

This time, you didn't have to be a rocket scientist to tell that they weren't out here on vacation, and that they were looking for something specific. They arrived onto the boat with a map and a specific destination, coordinates and all. 

There were four of them: three men and one woman. Two of the men were dressed much more casually than the third, who looked like he should be working at a car dealership. The woman was also dressed in business casual, making the group of them together look almost mismatched. One of the men mentioned something about looking for a ship, and James could have sworn he heard the man say 1939, but one of the other men shushed him, and the subject was changed before James could ask any more questions. 

He was skeptical about what this trip would bring, but he agreed to take them where they wanted to go. It was growing dark, as the boat approached the coordinates he had been given. The three men had elected to keep watch (maybe for the ship they were looking for), and the woman stayed in the shadows, not really paying attention to anything. She was pacing in small circles, and James wondered what was on her mind. 

He didn't really have time to think about it though, because soon a great big ship was looming in front of them. The lights were on and everything, he almost couldn't believe his eyes. "Is it the Queen Anne?" he heard the woman ask, and he wasn't sure if he heard that right. 

"That's her," one of the men confirmed, and James really thought he was losing it. He wasn't really a history buff, but he had a small working knowledge of some later maritime history, and if he wasn't mistaken, the Queen Anne had sunk in 1939, supposedly torpedoed by the Germans. Everyone had always accepted the story, even though no one had ever found the wreckage, but it looks like they were all wrong anyway. Was this what they were looking for? 

And it obviously was, because what felt like moments later his boat was empty. They had asked him to wait for them, and all he could do was marvel at the Queen Anne, who looked as new as the first day she sailed, in 1939.

***

Angela watched the group of four men leave one of the rooms and head out towards the main exit. The patient in that room must have just arrived today, because that room was empty yesterday when she did her rounds. She walked past one of the mid shift nurses, who was walking towards the nurses' station with some paperwork. "Hey, who's in 237?" she asked quickly. 

The other nurse looked up at the room in question, and then checked the papers she had in her hand. "His name's Mulder," she read off the page. "It doesn't say, but I think I heard someone say he's like a CIA agent or something." 

"Does it say what happened to him?" Angela asked. 

"It's not a gunshot, if that's what you're thinking," the other nurse said. "I think he almost drowned, they said. He's going to be okay, we just have to monitor him for a day or two." 

Angela nodded, and the two walked their separate ways. She peeked into the room, to see a man laying on the bed, and a red-haired woman was standing next to the bed. They were talking quietly among themselves, and while she couldn't see the woman's face, the man had a soft smile on his. She wondered who the woman was to him. A girlfriend? Wife? He looked enamored with her, and there was no doubt he was in love. She walked away slowly, leaving them to their conversation. She'd come back a little later, when visiting hours were over. Angela didn't like kicking people out of their loved ones' rooms at the end of the night, because she knew most people don't want to leave their friends or family in a strange place like the hospital. 

Thankfully, the woman left about twenty minutes before Angela would have had to say something, and she stopped in to give Mr. Mulder some medicine and a pitcher of water for the night. When she introduced herself, she found that he worked for the FBI, not the CIA. He seemed nice, if a little eccentric, and he never said a word about how he ended up in the hospital. She wasn't going to push him either, maybe it was some top-secret mission. 

Her roommate worked for the FBI too, as a receptionist. Angela wondered if they knew each other, or ever interacted in passing. She made a note to ask Alison the next time she saw her, and she closed the door to room 237. 

_\- the end -_


End file.
